


Breaking News

by Davechicken



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: In which the author is a grump about geopolitical current events, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2019-06-22
Packaged: 2020-05-16 14:10:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19319773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken
Summary: In which, Aziraphale should not be allowed to watch the television.





	Breaking News

Whenever he left the television on and vacated the room for any reason, Crowley would return to find the angel had been channel-hopping. He never turned the TV on himself, and wouldn’t think to watch it without Crowley, but he would inevitably flick through things if left alone for too long. 

It was endearing in the same way that many quirks were, which was to say: also incredibly frustrating. Sometimes it lead to them watching truly dire ‘documentaries’ (which Aziraphale would cluck at for the inaccuracies), saccharine love stories, programs about various wildlife (why did they need to watch that? They’d seen them all from Day One, for – for Noah’s sake), or the news.

Right now, it was the latter. Aziraphale was scowling at the lifeless voice and expressionless face reeling off the latest in ethnic tensions and ideological schisms. There were bombers here, voters there, protesters here, and the genuine worsening of everything that Crowley had come to associate with the impending fever-fits Humanity regularly went through. 

Every time it was the War to End All Wars. Either it was a hundred years, or trenches, or obliterating entire population centres... it was delendum est Carthago, fighting in the streets, or ‘let’s put all these people we don’t like over here’. Humanity had tried many times over the millennia to destroy themselves, and only really accomplished it partially. So, he wasn’t really worried. They’d lop off heads, blow stuff up, then all say how awful it was and go back to making more of themselves until they got shirty again.

“This is all _your lot’s_ fault,” the Principality snapped, reaching up for his cocoa with marshmallows all the same.

“... ‘my’ lot?” His smile, he knew, was forced. “What happened to ‘our own side’?”

“You knew what I meant.”

“Yeah, I did.” And it hurt, even though it shouldn’t. He should be proud that Aziraphale thought he’d engineered global tensions from his flat, without him having to lift a finger. It was supposed to have been his job and all. 

It wasn’t his fault that Humans turned out to be pretty awful enough without help, making his own interference really redundant. Now the numbers of them had increased so dramatically, any demonic influence had to be truly efficient and imaginative to have a real impact. Like, say, stoking up particular trends on social media. Or, indeed, _social media_. 

But he no longer really took all that much pleasure in it. Okay, sometimes it was fun, but not like it used to... he had enjoyed it, right? 

“No, I mean you... it’s... it’s—“

“Demon. Damned. You don’t need to remind me. I am fully aware of my own immortal ASBO.”

“Crowley!”

He shrugged, and went to the armchair instead of rejoining Aziraphale on the couch. “It’s just you know fine well that none of the Damned United could so much as organise a shoot up in a nunnery put next to Broadmoor when there’s a sale on escape equipment, tanks, and sawn-off shotguns, let alone anything as intricate as what’s going on right now.”

Indeed, the only demon who had remained ‘with’ the times enough to make good use of the tools at hand was he, himself. The worst part was, he knew precisely how to do most of it. He could make these links here, stoke this dissent there, hire bot networks and funnel proceeds of crimes into specific political campaign funds. Drop armament plans on the dark net. Make England lose Eurovision enough times. Post brochures of wall-builders to certain would-be world leaders. Sneeze near the Holy Land. You know. 

“I’m sorry. I just... I thought we’d stopped all this?”

“No." Crowley shrugged. "We stopped the Antichrist. This is just your normal world-ending stuff. Can’t stop that.”

“...we can’t?”

Technically they possibly could. Maybe. He’d never considered how to properly thwart Evil (for obvious reasons), but once Aziraphale asked, he couldn’t help but continue the thought experiment. Yes. There were ways to reduce the tension. Guide things more efficiently, more effectively. 

“W-ell...” He jiggled an ankle over his knee. “I s’pose so. But why?”

“Because we want the world to continue?”

“Yeah, but... why, really?”

“Because... it’s good?”

L—Ugh. Sometimes he wondered if Aziraphale thought about what he said, before he said it, or if his mouth was connected right to his brain. “Wasn’t the point of stopping the Apocalypse to let them... you know. Decide stuff?”

“But if they just end it all?”

“Then... I’d rather they didn’t, but isn’t that what Free Will was all about?” How were they supposed to look after every single incident that could possibly go wrong? They’d have to take away most of Humanity’s toys and relegate them to playpens, non-toxic crayons, safety gates on the staircases... the very concept of it made him shudder unpleasantly. It was difficult enough preventing his angel from ending himself in a discorporeated mess every five minutes. 

Aziraphale looked utterly despondent, squishing his semi-molten marshmallows against the side of his mug with his spoon. “And here I am, wanting to – wanting to control them...”

“I promise, if they look like they’ll press The Button, we’ll do something about it. But if they just... you know. Mess things up a bit... I think we should let them.”

If nothing else, Crowley’s not-heart wouldn’t take it. He blinked the channel onto something about hedgerows, and staunchly ignored the ‘we’re killing all the cute things with plastic’ voice that earnestly warbled over the top. He turned the sound down and hoped Aziraphale didn’t listen too intently to it, or he’d be complaining about the dodo and thylacine and pandas again. 

“Alright.” He didn’t sound too happy, but he was agreeing, at least. And it wasn’t the ‘I’ll agree to ‘stop’ this argument but it will in reality be continued in silence until I get angry enough to mention it again’ kind of agree. It was the ‘you’re right and I don’t like it but I’m going to accept it and look upset until you make me feel better’ sort of alright.

Crowley cursed himself all over again and went over to the couch, hiding the complicated expression in soft, fragrant curls. His angel burrowed under his chin and against his chest, demanding affection and comfort. Crowley couldn’t resist him, even as he told his body yet again that he wasn’t about to combust in flames just because they were cuddling.

“It’s just all this pointless division. They’d be much happier if they just – you know. Didn’t.”

“Yes, angel, I know.”

“That’s your l—that’s Hell, isn’t it?”

“Do you really want me to answer that?”

The wince in his arms said no, but the tiny little shudder said otherwise.

“In the Beginning—“

“Crowley...”

“No, stay with me. I mean it, and I’m not even being... She made Light and Dark. Firmament and whatnot. Heaven. Hell. Male. Female. Garden. Not.”

“But that doesn’t mean there’s—I mean obviously you can think why Heaven and Hell are... why Heaven is... but why would they draw lines all over the world and then murder one another?”

“People like to fight.”

Aziraphale didn’t answer, and his body went stiffer in Crowley’s arms. 

“They do,” he continued. “If you don’t give them a reason, they make one up. And they say it’s for Her, or they say it’s for them, or they just think it’s a fun thing to do on a weekend in a pub. And your ‘lot’ was just as bad. You just automatically blamed me for what the Humans got up to.”

“I... I was... upset.”

“Yeah. And maybe last century you might have been right, if I actually felt like it.”

“It wasn’t fair of me, though.”

“Eh. I’ll survive.” He was still mulling over why he’d felt so utterly hurt that Aziraphale still lumped him in with his old crowd, when he wasn’t exactly anything outwardly different. He was still a demon. He still didn’t want to be part of any kind of Heaven the way it turned out Heaven was. But... being blamed for things he hadn’t done...

(Like Falling. He still wasn’t convinced he was really as culpable at the start as Heaven judged him to be. Afterwards, sure, but he’d had nothing to lose, then.)

“I was just... frightened.” Aziraphale blinked, owlish and lost, up at him. 

“Of another war in the East? Brexit? Some wall across the pond that will likely never happen? It’s all happened before. We just hear about it faster,” Crowley tried to reassure him. 

“No, I...” He tried to avoid it, now, blowing over cocoa that was barely really warm. 

“Angel...”

“First I thought, if it happened, then I’d... then I’d lose you. And then I thought... what if you _had_?”

“...’Had’?”

“...had... done it. I... I started to think what if you changed your mind? What if you... what if you regretted it?”

“Regretted... what would give you that idea?”

He could feel Aziraphale blushing, hidden as he was. He could feel the shame and embarrassment and fear. His ridiculous angel, who would face down God and Satan and the antichrist... who was afraid of admitting this insecurity.

“I – I don’t—“

“ _I_ don’t. For the record. And I didn’t, when I thought we were going to be rendered into nothingness. And I’m not going to suddenly change my mind, or get bored, or be... anything other than what I am.” 

A little purr, and he was clearly saying the right things, because his angel was _beaming_ and scrunching himself into a tiny, bubbling ball. 

“My dear.”

“You’re stuck with me. Can’t say I won’t... cause the occasional brouhaha, but I didn’t want to end everything before, and I didn’t even really have a reason to fight for, that time. Now... now there’s nothing that would stop me.”

Crowley knew it, deep down, somewhere old and sure. Somewhere that had always felt this way. An instinct he couldn’t deny, a... drive to protect and cherish that curled insidiously around his being. Selfish, in that Aziraphale was his, and he needed him. Selfless, in that he knew he’d throw himself in Holy Water if he had to, if it was the only way to protect his angel. 

“You say such sweet things.”

“Leave it off.” His complaint was half-hearted at best, because the sudden radiance and Grace that smiled, damp-eyed at him, was painful to bear. “Don’t need to go all soft on me.”

Even as his fingers and thumbs toyed with an earlobe, ran down a whipcord of his neck. It hurt in his chest, thinking that he might lose him. Thinking that Aziraphale might still not trust him enough to know he meant it. 

But just as Crowley sometimes couldn’t accept that Aziraphale could truly love him, he guessed it was only right that the angel worry the same. Carefully, he pinched his chin still, so he could graze his lips and breath against the half-sad, half-happy lips. A flicker of tongue, and he licked his way past the resistance to siphon off the sorrow. 

The kiss continued for longer than was needed, but mostly because it felt so good. Crowley finished with a nudge of one sharp to one snub nose, and pushed their foreheads together.

“You’re stuck with me, angel.”

“Don’t let me forget. Please.”

“I promise.” 

The television moved on from the small creatures, onto something about space exploration. The angel squawked, and trilled in delight. They were sending more probes out, taking more pictures of the edges of Creation. 

“...they aren’t all bad, are they?” the angel mused. “If you leave them to it.”

“Nah. They’re alright. Reckon they’ll find the message I left on the moon any time soon?”

“You didn’t!”

“Like I was going to let that American get there, first.” He couldn’t wait to see NASA try to explain that.

And – as simple as that – his angel was happy again. At least until he found out what Crowley wrote, that was.


End file.
